


Ten Forward, Two Back

by thedevilchicken



Category: Star Trek: The Next Generation
Genre: Developing Relationship, M/M, Sexual Content, almost canon compliant
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-28
Updated: 2016-05-28
Packaged: 2018-07-10 18:48:49
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,251
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7000210
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thedevilchicken/pseuds/thedevilchicken
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's not perfect, but that doesn't mean it's not worthwhile.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Ten Forward, Two Back

**Author's Note:**

  * For [SilverDolphin](https://archiveofourown.org/users/SilverDolphin/gifts).



> Set in an indistinct time period while Geordi's on the Enterprise E and Reg is with Pathfinder in San Francisco. 
> 
> For SilverDolphin - I really hope you enjoy!

"Are you sure you want to do this?" Reg says, kneeling there between Geordi's thighs, so nervous he sounds like he's on the verge of a panic attack, and that wouldn't be first time. "Maybe we should just go out and have a drink instead? The restaurant might still be open. Or we could go to the holo--"

"No more holo-dates, Reg," Geordi interrupts, hoisting himself up from his back and up onto his forearms. "Don't you remember what happened when we did that the last time?"

Reg ducks his head and Geordi tries and fails to hide a smile as he runs the fingers of both his hands through Reg's hair, so he'll know he's not really mad about it, he's just more into what they're doing now than in the latest instalment of Reg's holographic escapades. He does remember the last time, though, and he _still_ can't look Captain Picard in the eye, months later. He never really thought he'd miss the plausible deniability his VISOR sometimes gave him, where the only one who could tell which way he was looking the majority of the time was Data and Data was sworn to total secrecy, but that's the fact of it. Still, he's mostly just been tapping at a console or frowning at a PADD every time the captain walks through Engineering and crossing his fingers that no one will notice, but Counselor Troi keeps shooting him odd looks. It's probably her sense of self-preservation that's kept her from asking about it. Geordi thinks that's for the best. 

"So, you mean...you're sure?" Reg says, and Geordi sighs and reaches up and ruffles Reg's hair. They've been through this before, before his shuttle came in, but they'll go through it again if that's what it takes. Sometimes, that's what it takes with Reg. 

"I'm sure," he replies, and he sounds sure, he thinks. He _is_ sure, sure as he's been in a pretty long time. "Relax, don't worry; it'll be fine."

"I'm not worried," Reg says, and even if he hadn't said it at something pretty close to warp 9.9, his tone would've given the game away. To Geordi, at least, because he knows Reg Barclay's tones of voice, what each one means, every nuance. He's had a lot of time to work them out, over the years, as colleagues and friends and now...something else.

Geordi raises his brows. "C'mon, Reg. You're worried."

Reg ducks his head again. "Maybe I'm _slightly_ worried," he says, with a nervous smile, and he glances up at Geordi to make sure that that's okay. "You're not going to change your mind?" 

And okay, so over the years Geordi's changed his mind about a lot of things. But he doesn't think this is going be one of them. 

It started years ago, Geordi guesses, not the first time they met because they met a _long_ time ago and at the time he didn't know what to think of Reg Barclay. He knows Reg isn't dumb, but there've been times he's done dumb things, said dumb things, and some of his ill-advised holodeck programs are pretty high on that list, though Geordi thinks maybe Pathfinder's been good for him. He seems more at ease in San Francisco than he ever was on the Enterprise, either D or E; at least he's sounded that way in his messages since he started there. It's done nothing for his obsessions, of course, but Geordi's never thought he'd change him. That's not the objective at all.

It started years ago, over schematics that Reg sent to the Enterprise for Geordi to look over like he didn't trust himself or his own judgement. They were in range for subspace communication so they talked it over and the next thing Geordi knew he'd put together a holodeck simulation of Reg's lab and they were working together at least a couple of nights a week for a couple of months at least. Then the Enterprise moved out of range and they sent recorded messages instead, greater and greater time delay as they sped farther away from Earth. Reg seemed more self-assured in his recordings, there in his apartment surrounded by tools and pieces of half-dismantled equipment, hyperspanners and laser cutters and Geordi guessed that made sense in a way. He was in his element there, just like Geordi was in his there on the Enterprise. It was hard not to see him differently, when he saw him like that. 

It started while they weren't even in the same sector and soon Geordi had started to look forward to receiving new messages coming in from his old crewmate, not that he'd thought of him as a crewmate as much as a friend in a while by then. Close to a year passed after that before the Enterprise was due back into Earth's orbit and they made plans to meet once they were back in range for live conversation, Reg sounding more nervous then than he had in months, flitting from one thing to the next around the room as he talked a mile a minute. Geordi remembered that pretty well from main Engineering, and the Enterprise's holodecks.

They arranged to meet in a restaurant down the street from Reg's place but when Geordi arrived, there was not a single sign of Reg. He had a drink, had two drinks then a third, ate breadsticks like they were going out of style then asked his waiter where he'd find the nearest public holosuite. And there was Reg when Geordi arrived, once he'd talked his way in, hiding in the holosuite, having dinner in a holographic version of the restaurant Geordi had just left with a holographic guy who looked a whole lot like Geordi. Or at least he looked like Geordi had not very long ago, on the Enterprise D, a strange version of his old VISOR included. Reg even looked halfway to happy sitting there and Geordi thinks he was confused, until the holographic not-himself stood up and kissed Reg on the mouth. Geordi's eyes went wide. 

He cleared his throat. Reg turned and spluttered. 

"I've been stood up before, Reg, but never for myself," Geordi said, not sure how to take anything that he'd just seen, and Reg smiled a sheepish smile and stumbled up to his feet from the table, wiping his hands on his shirt. "C'mon, I still need to have dinner."

Reg said nothing. He went along. And later that night, after Geordi had left Earth again, when he was back in his quarters on the Enterprise, he sat down and he through the strange, fleeting visit through. Maybe he talked to Counselor Troi in the morning, maybe he talked to her more than once that week, though he swore her to silence after because he had a feeling he knew what Will Riker would say. He went to work and tapped approvals to work orders on PADDs that passed his desk, played Watson to Data's Holmes though he was still sometimes wary that Moriarty might appear, even though he couldn't, or at least shouldn't. Then he sat himself down at the screen in his quarters and he put a message through to Reg. 

"I've deleted the program," Reg told him, awkwardly, stammering, fiddling with a half-built contraption in his hands. 

"Good," Geordi said, "but that's not why I'm calling." He cocked his head and grinned and Reg's eyes went wide. The contraption fell down to the floor and Geordi said he was sorry for that, but the way Reg practically beamed at him said he didn't mind at all. 

It's been a couple of years since then or maybe more, not that Geordi made a note of the stardate though maybe Reg would know if he asked. And they're apart more than they're together, keeping up with each other through subspace, messages that they record, holographic images that they send now and then. They kissed one night in Geordi's quarters on the Enterprise, Reg seeming puzzled by the notion Geordi really liked him that way and maybe Geordi was too, in a way, except not the way that Reg was. He's funny and he's smart and okay, so he's not blessed with social graces, but Geordi's never been all that lucky, either, at least not when it comes love. Everyone's surprised it's lasted this long. 'Everyone' includes both him and Reg, but everyone wishes them well. 

"I'm not going to change my mind," Geordi says, and there's a moment when Reg looks bemused as he sits there, like he has no idea what he's meant to do next, even though they've talked this through in a few of their more embarrassing conversations just so he _wouldn't_ get that way when the time eventually came. Geordi guesses he knew it'd happen anyway, because it's Reg and because it's the first time they've been together in the same place for more than a night or two in years and it's the first time they've both managed to clear their calendars, the first time they've not had a call come in from the Pathfinder or the Enterprise, though he doesn't want to jinx it and say that absolutely won't happen tonight, either. It probably will. It's the way their lives seem to go. And it's the first time they've done this. Geordi's pretty surprised he even managed to get Reg to take off his clothes, let alone go any further, but here they are. 

Reg looks bemused but these days Geordi's charmed by that and he goes down off of his forearms and back onto the bed. Reg takes the cue and he's flustered but Geordi's also charmed by that. Reg is flushed and his hair is sticking up in all possible directions at once and Geordi watches him, shifts one thigh to rub against Reg's bare waist and Reg starts with it and laughs out loud, nervously, at himself. Geordi reaches down and squeezes Reg's thighs, looks up at him to let him know he's not the only one who's nervous. He's nervous too, but he wants it. When their gazes meet, they know it's going to happen. 

When Reg finally finds his mark and finds his angle and pushes into him, Geordi's not quite ready and it makes him gasp and makes Reg look stricken, at least till Geordi wraps his legs around his waist and pulls him tighter to him. Then Reg's eyes are wide with surprise and with pleasure and Geordi's fairly sure his are wide as saucers just to match. It's not perfect, but it's taken them years to get to this and it's taken Geordi years to understand that nothing's perfect, _nothing_ is. So his hands close tight at Reg's biceps and Reg's hips thrust forward and it's awkward at first because everything about them has been awkward, at first, since the start, since they met. It's taken years for Reg to believe that this isn't some kind of elaborate prank, like a cryptic crossword that's been set to trip him up. It's taken years for Geordi to believe his love life's not one giant curse. It's like every ten steps they take forward's meant another two back, but they're getting there. They'll get there. 

When Reg finishes with stuttering jerks of his hips, he pulls back out and he apologizes. Geordi laughs, breathlessly, stroking himself still there on his back in Reg's bed in the midst of all the half-dismantled parts of broken things strewn over every single flat surface, and they might put them back together later, Reg getting overexcited over making things work again for the first time in years. Sometimes, between planets, watching stars streak by from the windows in his quarters, Geordi wonders if the two of them are some of the things that they've made work. They're less dysfunctional together than they are apart, at least. 

"Don't apologize," he says. "That was great, Reg. That was really great." And he means it, he really does, because he's never wanted stay someplace as much as he wants to stay here, on Earth, in San Francisco, in this bed. "You're allowed to touch me, you know. I won't bite." 

Reg laughs and grins and stretches out and then he puts his hands on him and when Geordi's done, his eyes squeezed shut and muscles tight, fingers twisted with the bedsheets, Reg wipes them both down and he pulls up the sheets. He props his head up on one hand and he beams at Geordi like a puzzle he's just solved. 

Maybe it's not perfect, this thing they've got, but that doesn't mean that Geordi won't stay the night, doesn't mean he won't stay the week, doesn't mean he won't stay till his shore leave's over and they've both got work to go back to. Reg's place is big enough for two at least for that long, and Geordi hopes this first time will lead to second might lead to third, that they'll eat and they'll drink and maybe they'll argue over schematics or the plot of Reg's latest holonovel before they head to bed to sleep. It's taken time but when Geordi's uniform comes off, Reg can finally see the two of them as equals. Reg can finally see what he wanted from Geordi is something Geordi also wants from him. 

It's not perfect, but that doesn't mean it's not worthwhile. 

It's not perfect, Geordi thinks, but it's close.


End file.
